Uncle Martin
by SteveGon
Summary: A story from the world of Adrian's Undead Diary.


Uncle Martin (A Tale from the World of Adrian's Undead Diary)

Jesse Garcia studied the aging farmhouse. Obviously it had been abandoned long before June 23rd. Haunted by ghosts maybe, but Jesse was pretty sure there were no zombies around.

The old home was grayed and weather-beaten, fraying around its edges like a rough sketch in pencil. Several small outbuildings leaned in the overgrown yard like gravestones huddled around a tomb.

"I think it's okay." said Jesse.

Jesse's uncle Martin sat behind him on a crumbling stone wall covered with thick vines. Martin wheezed and forced a smile. "It'll be good to spend a night or two indoors." he replied weakly. Martin was too damned old to be sleeping outside.

Jesse nodded and examined the dilapidated structure again. The sun was a sliver of orange melting on the horizon and it was difficult to make out details in the gloom. Jesse hoped the house was safe.

Martin hooked a vine with his finger. The creeping plant had the fence in a snug embrace, its tendrils were pulling the stones back into the earth where they belonged. Martin closed his eyes and imagined the vines pulling him down into the moist ground where it would be cool and quiet. There he would be free from the illness and dread that plagued him.

Martin had been sick for weeks. His chest ached from a constant cough. His head pounded and burned and his clothes were soaked with sweat. Martin was sure he was dying.

A flashbulb went off in Martin's head. The image of a white room smashed his somber fantasy into black shards. The shards turned into crows that winged away, cawing, until they were blotted out by whiteness.

An unseen voice tickled the inside of Martin's head. "There is no solace in death." The refrain was repeated two more times. Angels maybe, whispering warnings in his ear?

Martin didn't need angels to tell him the dead no longer enjoyed the peace of the grave. He could see the damned things walking around. They'd been trying to eat him and Jesse for months. Zombies.

Jesse mumbled something and Martin opened his eyes.

"Can you make it?" Jesse asked again. Martin coughed harshly and a wad of phlegm flew from his mouth, barely missing Jesse's leg. The sputum was flecked with blood. Jesse's face revealed both concern and disgust.

At sixty-four Martin had been surviving the zombie apocalypse remarkably well. Months of walking and a forced diet had shorn his frame of its flabbiness. Stern eyes were flanked by tangles of long black hair run through with gray. He had cast off the weight of resentment and disappointment that burdened his life and replaced it with a focus on survival. Then he'd gotten sick.

"I'll be fine." Martin said, taking a sip of water from his canteen. "Just need some sleep. Maybe there's a bed in there with a bottle of Jack under the pillow."

Jesse grinned. "Or maybe there's a bottle of that nasty cough syrup mom made me take when I was a kid. How'd you like that?"

"Up yours." grunted Martin.

He stood and leaned on a four foot length of lead pipe that served as both a walking stick and a bludgeon. The grooves on the end of the pipe were caked with dirt and dried blood. Martin had bashed in many a zombie skull with it. He poked Jesse in the ass with the pipe. "After you, chico."

Martin often kidded his nephew about being a boy even though Jesse was thirty-six. It surprised him that Jesse had lasted so long after June 23rd. If Martin had known what was coming he would have bet that Jesse wouldn't have survived the first day. Lots of better men hadn't.

Jesse was soft. Martin knew that. As an only child Jesse had been spoiled by his parents. He was gangling and gentle by nature and was blessed with the traditional dark family hair that made him look like a latino version of the character Shaggy from that famous cartoon. Unlike Shaggy, the monsters would have gotten Jesse long ago were it not for Martin.

Jesse was still regarding the farmhouse and stroking the stubble that covered his face. Despite months of not shaving, the hairs refused to blossom into a full beard. Martin poked him again.

"Ow!" cried Jesse. "That hurt!"

"A bite from one of those things would hurt even more." said Martin. "Now let's get going."

The house was completely boarded up. Even the windows on the second floor were planked over. The front door had been replaced with a sheet of plywood reinforced with two-by-fours. Jesse thumped the barrier with the rusty crowbar he carried as a weapon. "Anyone here?" he called.

Jesse and Martin waited a few minutes. Nothing. Jesse shrugged. "Guess no one's in. Probably went to a hoedown!"

It was common to find homes full of zombies. Even though the farmhouse was decrepit and probably empty, they had to be careful.

Jesse pulled a hand cranked flashlight from the duffle bag that held their few possessions. Charging the flashlight reminded Jesse of a movie camera he'd seen in a silent film about Egypt. He felt like Howard Carter at the tomb of Tutankhamun. If there were monsters in the house they wouldn't be mummies.

When the flashlight was charged Jesse ran the light over the sagging porch they were standing on. He saw the outline of a welcome mat, dead leaves and an old wine bottle probably left behind by a transient. Jesse wondered if the man was dead and shuffling out there in the dark, watching them.

Beyond the trees that fringed the yard squatted a barn that Jesse had already explored. The barn was in much worse shape than the house. It was collapsing in on itself, sucked in by the black hole of decrepitude. Salvadore Dali couldn't have envisioned a more twisted architecture.

The interior of the barn had smelled of piss and was littered with the boozy detritus of other bums. "We can't stay here." Jesse had said to his uncle Martin. "One sneeze from you and the whole thing will come down!"

"Quit daydreaming and open her up." Martin said with a wheeze. Jesse held the flashlight under his chin, illuminating his face. "They're coming to get you, Martin!" he intoned, mimicking a famous horror movie scene.

Martin rolled his eyes. It was good that Jesse still had a sense of humor but sometimes the jokes really grated on his nerves.

A wave of pain washed up in Martin's skull. He wavered on his feet. Phantoms danced in his eyes. A white room spun madly and dark lurching figures reached for him with decayed fingers and gnashing teeth.

The evil loosed on the world had seeped into Martin's very being, poisoning him. Martin knew the cure lay east of them, his fevered dreams told him so. Go east and find redemption. They may have been hallucinations but they gave him hope. There was still good in the world.

"Quit daydreaming and take the flashlight." laughed Jesse.

Jesse handed the flashlight to Martin and attacked the two-by-fours with his crowbar. The door frame they were nailed to was dry and brittle and gave up the boards without a fight. The plywood proved more difficult to remove as it had been cut to fit within the door frame. Jesse managed to pry one corner loose. He stuck his fingers in the gap and wrenched the barrier free with a shriek of rending nails.

Jesse held the plywood out like a shield as Martin stepped forward and shined the flashlight in the doorway. No zombies came shuffling out. Not even a cat or a bat to startle them with a cheap scare. The house offered nothing more dangerous than raggedy cobwebs and a musty odor that wrinkled their noses.

Jesse kicked at the dust on the floor inside the house. "No one has been here for a long time." he said. They were standing in what had once been a living room. Jesse mulled that over. Empty houses depressed him.

Martin waved the flashlight around the living room like a lighthouse keeper searching for wayward ships. The beam revealed an enormous couch that had likely been considered too big to bother moving. The couch sagged in the middle, grinning at them like a fat Cheshire Cat. An empty gun cabinet stood like a disarmed sentinel against a wall. Save for those two items the room was bare.

Three doorways and a set of stairs called out for further investigation. It was like being on the set of a macabre game show. Behind which door is the flesh-eating zombie?

The first thing they had to do was secure the front entrance. Jesse pulled the gun cabinet in front of the doorway, blocking it. "No wonder they left it behind." he said. "It's heavier than your last girlfriend!" Martin ignored him. He didn't like to joke about women.

Martin walked over to the couch and thumped it with his pipe. No critters or unduly large spiders emerged so he sat down. He handed the flashlight to Jesse. "Take a look around." he said. "I need to rest for a bit. I'm really tired. I think I'll take a nap."

One door led to a kitchen. The cheap linoleum that covered the floor was curling with age. Open cupboard doors mocked Jesse by showing off bare shelves. Then his flashlight revealed a single can sitting on a dusty counter. Jesse's stomach growled in anticipation. He picked the can up and read the label. Lima beans. He hated lima beans!

People ate much worse than lima beans when they were starving. Jesse moved the flashlight closer and read the expiration date: 4/18/82. Jesse had been eight when the contents of the can expired.

Jesse knew that canned food was edible far past the expiration date but he was still leery. If he was going to get food poisoning it may as well come from something he liked. He put the can down and sighed. Something in the dark shifted and laughed. Jesse could hear his uncle Martin snoring away in the other room. It must have been his imagination.

"Don't let your fear get the better of you." Martin had told him. Jesse took a deep breath. He would check out the rest of the house. Then he noticed the envelope.

The can had been holding down a letter for decades. The name Charles was scrawled on the yellowed envelope in a terse script. Jesse opened it and pulled out a single piece of lined paper.

"Charles,

If you get this letter I thank God you have returned. I am sorry for what passed between us. I should have told you sooner that you weren't my my biological son. Please believe me when I say that in my heart I always felt that you were. I may have treated you harshly but that was not the reason why. Your dear mother went to Heaven last year. I am happy that she is with the Lord but I cannot stand living in this house without her or you. I am going to Texas to live with my brother Robert. I have left the house in your name. Mr. Evans at the bank has all the details as well as some money for you. Please take some flowers to your mother's grave and say goodbye to her.

Your loving father, James"

The letter also included a black and white picture of a family of three. The photo reminded Jesse of the painting American Gothic with the pitchfork replaced by a young boy. In the bottom of the envelope was an obituary notice for an Ada Martins that left Jesse's fingers smudged with ink.

Jesse felt an ineffable sense of sadness. Apparently Charles had never returned. He and his father were likely dead, their differences never resolved. What was the point in going on? Life on earth had been reduced to a mad scrabble for survival. Every day was a trial of hunger and despair. Every road led to death. Why not just give in? Everyone Jesse knew was dead. Except for uncle Martin and Adrian.

What? Where had that come from?

Jesse hadn't thought of Adrian Ring in years. Adrian was a boy Jesse had known in elementary school back east. He remembered playing dodgeball and smear the queer with Adrian and some other boys during fourth grade recess. The faces of those other boys flickered in his head like images in a faded Super 8 film but Adrian's was crystal clear. Weird.

Jesse checked the other two rooms on the ground floor. One was a bathroom boasting an antique clawfoot bathtub and an empty medicine cabinet that was hung slightly crooked. The other room was a study lined with bookshelves that offered Jesse a set of encyclopedias dating back to 1968. An antique Davenport desk squatted dejectedly in the center of the room, its secrets long gone.

Jesse went upstairs. A hallway separated the stairwell from two bedrooms. One was empty. In the other was a bed covered in plastic sheeting. A dresser stood in one corner. In the top drawer was a bible. Written on the inside of its front cover were the words "To Charles from mom and dad."

Jesse put the bible back and closed the drawer. At least uncle Martin had his bed. No pillows or Jack Daniels though.

Jesse tromped downstairs. "That you?" asked Martin. The couch had all but swallowed him. Jesse turned the flashlight on his uncle. Martin was flushed and sweat beaded on his forehead. He wheezed and his chest rattled. "I'm in a bad way, kid."

Jesse nodded. "Found you a bed upstairs." he said. "But no Jack Daniels."

Martin pushed himself up and out of the couch. Spittle hung from one corner of his mouth. He wiped it on a sleeve in disgust. "Never wanted to go out like this." he thought to himself.

"Come on, grandpa!" laughed Jesse. "I'll help you up the stairs!"

It bothered Martin that he was now weaker than Jesse. And that made him ashamed.

"How is it?" asked Jesse. Martin was lying on the bed. The plastic sheeting rustled when he moved.

"Beats sleeping under a bush." Martin replied. "I always wanted to die in bed."

Jesse frowned and sat down next to his uncle. "You're not gonna die here." he said. The thought of his uncle dying scared Jesse more than anything.

Martin made a fist and thumped Jesse's back. "I think it'll be better if you sleep in the other room." Jesse understood what his uncle meant but protested anyway.

"Don't argue with me." Martin told Jesse. "If I die the last thing I want to do is take a bite out of your skinny ass."

Jesse nodded. He was glad the darkness hid his tears.

"Lock the door on your way out." said Martin with a grin. "I don't want you sneaking back in here after I'm asleep!"

Jesse leaned against a wall in the empty bedroom. He could hear his uncle coughing through the wall. His uncle was all Jesse had left. Without him what would he do? Martin had saved Jesse in the days after June 23rd. That was when it had started.

Jesse had been working in the comic book store on June 23rd. Stocking comics, listening to Cream on the radio and flirting with Maddie, his favorite customer. Maddie was young, petite and perky. She had striking green eyes that sparkled behind her over-sized glasses. A delightful package topped off with a pixie cut.

Jesse had been telling Maddie about a Mustang convertible he had his eye on. That was when the music stopped.

Frantic news reports were taking over the airwaves. Some crazy story about the dead returning to life. Maddie had left after that. Jesse remembered her saying something about a dream she'd had the night before.

Jesse was sure the news reports were some sort of misunderstanding or exaggeration. He had also hoped that sales of his zombie comics would skyrocket. No such luck. Maddie had been his last customer.

By the end of the day the stories were confirmed and Jesse could hear gunshots. His mother and father hadn't answered their phone so he'd locked up the store and walked to their house. When he got there, uncle Martin had been standing on the porch with a funny look on his face.

"They're not here." Martin had said. "Come on, let's go to my place. I left them a note to join us."

Martin owned a bar and lived in an apartment on the second floor. The only value in the place as a sanctuary were the barred windows and solid doors. Unfortunately the streets were packed with cars, many of them wrecked. Fights were breaking out. A disaster movie come to life. That was when Jesse and Martin saw their first zombie.

Jesse closed his eyes as his recollection sped up. A kaleidoscope of horrors marching by in fast forward.

A man trapped in a smashed pickup truck, his chest crushed. A passerby reaching in to help and getting bitten on the arm for his trouble. The good samaritan screaming and another man blowing his head off with a shotgun. The man with the shotgun killing the thing in the truck.

Uncle Martin pulling Jesse from his car and pushing him through the crowd. Running with him through a field and into a stand of woods.

Standing on a corner and watching Martin's bar burn to the ground.

Wandering the countryside, scavenging what food and supplies they could. Martin killing the dead they ran across. He called them abominations.

Walking through a small village and seeing a mountain of burned bodies in an empty lot. A single arm sticking out, fingers clawing the air.

Zombies pulling at a chain link fence crowned with barbed wire. In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida booming from loudspeakers. Men behind the fence laughing and shooting the zombies.

Martin had done all the killing and most of the scavenging. Jesse had felt useless. He'd never known any hardship. Didn't have any survival skills. He was something less than a man. He could see that in his uncle Martin's eyes.

Jesse's visions slowed. Adrian Ring floated in front of him and disappeared.

The last time Jesse had seen Adrian was in the summer between fourth and fifth grades. Jesse's father had announced they were moving to Ohio where he'd gotten a job as a factory foreman. Jesse and his mother had went shopping at K-Mart for moving supplies.

They'd been in the checkout lane when Jesse spied Adrian walking through the doors with his mother and little sister. Adrian hadn't seen him and kept on walking. Jesse wondered what Adrian looked like now, if he was still alive.

"He killed them you know."

The hairs on Jesse's nape stood up. Something was in the room with him.

"He loved and hated your mother for what she did. Why do you think he followed her to Ohio?"

Jesse played the flashlight around the room. Nothing.

"Your uncle is a murderer. He used the chaos to hide his crime."

A vision formed in front of Jesse's eyes. His uncle was standing over his parents holding a bloody knife. The same knife Jesse carried in his duffle bag. The one Martin insisted that Jesse carry.

Jesse hated the nightmares. He'd been having strange visions ever since the apocalypse. He sensed uncle Martin was having them too but they hadn't discussed it. Neither wanted to admit they were probably crazy.

"He's not your uncle."

Jesse closed his eyes tightly. A white room appeared in the distance. Then it winked out.

"Adrian." whispered Jesse.

"Forget Adrian! He's rotting in the ground!"

A cold vise squeezed Jesse's heart and he gasped for breath.

"Your father just died!"

Thump!

The sound had come from the other bedroom. Something was pounding on the door.

The door rattled in its frame.

"Uncle Martin?" called Jesse. He was fully awake now and standing in front of Martin's bedroom door. The visions had receded.

Thump! Scratch!

Jesse knew his uncle must have died. His reanimated corpse was trying to force its way through the door. Trying to get at him. Trying to eat him. Jesse retreated to his bedroom and closed the door. He was holding Martin's knife in his hand.

Maddie coalesced in front of Jesse. "Come with me." she said with a smile.

"There is no solace in death."

Martin woke up with a start. Sunlight streamed through the spaces between the boards that covered the bedroom window. His fever had broken in the night and his head no longer throbbed. He was still alive.

Martin coughed and a clotted piece of sputum landed on his shirt. He probed it with a finger. It was dry and sticky, a sign that his lungs were clearing up.

The visions had come again in his sleep. The white room with three indistinct faces beckoning to him. A mohawked man Martin didn't know was killing zombies. Then Jesse screamed. A murder of crows was lifting him into a darkening sky.

Martin sat up. "Jesse!" he screamed. "Answer me!"

All of a sudden Martin was freezing. He felt light-headed. Something awful had happened.

Martin tapped Jesse's bedroom door with the lead pipe. "Jesse?"

He turned the knob and pushed the door open. Jesse was standing in the middle of the room in a pool of blood, painted with stripes of sunlight from the window. Flies and dust motes danced around him

Jesse was dead. He had slit his wrists with Martin's knife. The knife was still clutched in one hand.

The zombie that had been Jesse Garcia lifted its head and looked at Martin with hollow eyes. It clacked its teeth and took a step forward, its feet sticking in the drying blood. It held out a hand and offered the knife to Martin.

Something whispered in Martin's ear. "Join us."

"You bastards!" cried Martin. "Why didn't you just take me?"

Martin swung the pipe and hit the zombie in the side of its head. Bone crunched. An eye squirted out of its socket and landed on the floor. The zombie continued its advance, comically slipping as it stepped on the eye.

Martin held the pipe over his head and brought it down squarely on the zombie's skull, splitting it open. The zombie dropped the knife and keeled over, thudding on the floor. It twitched once and was still. Martin hit it again just to be sure.

Pieces of brain were clinging to the pipe like fat slugs. Martin tossed it away in disgust. He no longer wanted it. The crowbar would have to do.

A trail of blood led from the center of the room to a wall. On the wall, in his own blood, Jesse had written the name Adrian and the word "east."

Martin studied the words and nodded. It was time to go. But first he had to take care of Jesse.

Martin covered his nephew with the plastic sheeting but the flies just crawled under it. He would have to do something about that. He wouldn't leave Jesse for the bugs.

The smoke rising from the old farmhouse hung over the sun like a shroud of gauze. Martin sat on the stone wall and watched Jesse's funeral pyre burn. He picked at the vines that ensnared the stones. Death no longer appealed to him.

Perched on the fence on the other side of the yard was a single crow. It cawed angrily and fluttered off into the sky, becoming one with the smoke.

Martin drank some water from his canteen. He had a long haul in front of him. He was headed east.

Jesse's duffle bag lay beside Martin. He ran through its contents in his head. Flashlight, crowbar, knife, matches and a nearly empty tin of lighter fluid. A picture of Jesse and his parents. Plus a can of lima beans he'd found in the kitchen. Not much to travel with. At least the beans would make a good lunch.

Author's note: check out the adventures of Adrian Ring at adriansundeaddiarydotcom

Adrian's Undead Diary created by Chris Philbrook


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